Welcome to the Piano World Piano ForumsOver 2 million posts about pianos, digital pianos, and all types of keyboard instruments
Join the World's Largest Community of Piano Lovers
(it's free)
It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!

Hello. This is my first post. I am looking to buy a digital piano in the next 4 months or so, so I have a while to look around. I am planning on buying a digital as a "temporary" instrument - something to play on for maybe 2 or 3 years (I have played for 16 years and have always had an acoustic at home). Eventually I plan to upgrade to acoustic, probably upright, though I dream of owning a grand.Anyway, should I look into buying a new digital or a used one? Somehow I would think I could get more for the dollar buying used. However, if I buy new, the dealer would take full value trade-in for an upgrade for several years. Plus I would have the warranty. But I also think that when I'm ready to upgrade, what's to say I won't buy something used, also at a better price than the dealer? I suppose I could buy new from the dealer and then sell on my own when I'm ready to upgrade. Any thoughts on this? My budget for whatever digital I buy is somewhere around $2,000 give or take a little.

I grew up with classical lessons and acousticpianos only. But since 1989 I've been playingdigitals and see no reason to "upgrade" toan acoustic. Weighted-key digital pianoshave sound and action based on a concertgrand, so that's a pretty good piano rightthere. I've used digitals to work on themost difficult classical repertoire, likethe big Romantic Era concertos, and theyserve fine for that purpose. Note: onan acoustic I would never have been ableto tackle such difficult pieces, becauseI've had to work them up note by note,and doing that on a acoustic would getyou laughed out of the neighborhood.

Digital pianos are computers and are pricedlike computers. Used ones lose valuefast and are great buys. A 10 yr. olddigital, like a 10 yr. old computer, isworth only a couple of hundred dollars.But whereas a 10 yr. old computer is hardlyusable on internet, a 10 yr. old digitalwould play much like a brand new onecosting thousands. That's value.

Note that there have been good, weighted-key digital pianos from as far back as the1980's. Such pianos will perform muchlike new digitals, but, like a computerfrom the 1980's, they are almost worthless,and you can get them for almost nothing.More great value.

My view on price of new digitals is thatyou don't need to pay more than $1000to get a good one. And you don't haveto stick to the big-name brands either.Some people go for the lesser-known brandswith catchy names like: Adagio, Winchester,Diginova, Williams, Hemingway, etc. Theseshould be just as playable as the well-knownbrands. My current piano, a Korg SP-250lighweight console, was $900 online. Andmy previous one, a Casio AP-24 console, was $700online. They've served well for workingon the difficult classical repertoire thatI play.

Originally posted by angry_ferret: Anyway, should I look into buying a new digital or a used one? [/b]

I went through this about a year ago. My observation was that popular stage pianos that retail for under about $1000 don't lose enough of their value to justify buying used. Cabinet style pianos lose a larger fraction of their initial value, particularly as you get up into the grand cabinet. This is based on buying on ebay, where prices seem higher than other advertising sources. If you find something on Craig's list, or a local newspaper, used prices are generally lower.

Since you are experienced, I'd suggest playing the major brands to see which one feels best to you. Then become knowledgeable about used prices on that particular brand and model by watching ebay for awhile and see if the savings justify buying used.